Posted on 10/17/2020 7:46:42 AM PDT by Tallguy
Heather Price knows her way around gases. An atmospheric chemist at North Seattle College, she studies outdoor air pollution, the flow and change of chemicals in Earth’s atmosphere. But she wasn’t worried about the gas stove in her own home before her son developed asthma and, at two and a half years old, had to use his inhaler multiple times a day. She started to wonder: Was gas making her family sick? Sign up for The Atlantic’s daily newsletter. Price’s house ran on natural gas—“gas stove, gas furnace, gas hot-water heater,” she says. In American homes, this setup is quite common, but gas appliances—and gas stoves in particular—have costs. Cooking on a gas stove unleashes some of the same fumes found in car exhaust. If those fumes are not vented outside the house, they linger and sneak into lungs.
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Well, yea, burning gas depletes Oxygen and gives out Carbon Dioxide (but thankfully not Carbon Monoxide, in most cases). So if you live in a relatively closed environment and burn gas (or anything) you’ll lower the Oxygen content in that environment.
And, if you insist on making Greta happy and lived in a sealed-up home, you’ll have a number of issues, including Carbon Dioxide build-up, Oxygen depletion, and depending on the materials used in construction, possibly the build-up of nasty chemicals, like formaldehyde.
Gas stoves are pretty clean and unless you have a hermetically sealed house, there should not be a problem (houses need to breathe). All of our family grew up with gas stove/water heaters and my older brother at 77 is still going strong. :)
A few years ago I moved from Michigan where almost everything in natural gas to Maryland, where it’s a mix of gas, heating oil and electric.
Requirement number one for a house was natural gas. A friend has a very large house that’s all electric. He can barely afford to heat the place.
Heather is full of gas and has NO freaking idea what she is talking about. Direct gas burning appliances are by FAR the Best use of energy. Electric appliances have to receive energy that is created miles away in plants that are NOT as efficient and then suffer losses from transmission.
Blue Flame = Complete Combustion
So, no (negligible) carbon monoxide produced. Completely safe for everyone even without the vent running.
Orange flame means not enough oxygen.
It’s not the stove that’s the problem, it’s the ventilation. See: sick homes.
Umm, no they are not, especially gas ranges.
Yeah. Carbon dioxide, and water vapor!
ML/NJ
This is just the left’s war on natural gas. They want to get everyone on 100% electricity. Then they can shut you down with one click. Or better yet, have your smart meter enforce it. They all have a demand limiting feature where they can set a maximum current draw and if you exceed it the meter cuts you off for some predetermined period of time.
The war on global warming (and you) is coming.
Just an aside on your comment: I am a scuba diver -- that's my hobby. The most convenient place to hang-up my drysuit to drip dry is on the very end of my garage door track. But I have to take it down as soon as it dries, otherwise my rubber wrist seals begin to dry rot and crack. I've been told it's the minute amount of gasoline that leaks from the vent holes of the gas cans (also stored in the garage). So yes, any kind of hydro carbon is likely to attack your rubber seals, gaskets and so forth given enough time.
Most gas ranges today do not have pilot lights, they have electric ignitors.
For you new-fangled types!
I know a place in Millersburg, Ohio if you really want one.
The Amish don’t have electricity in the house, so no electric igniter.
Yep! And a woman working as an "Atmospheric Chemist" at a community college in Seattle probably has her home sealed tighter than an Army Chemical Warfare Lab to save on energy bills.
Let's see. CH4 + 3 O2 -> CO2 + 2 H2O
But glucose metabolism C₆H₁₂O₆ + 6 O2 -> 6 CO2 + 6 H2O
So the chemicals that are "sneaking" into the lungs are the same ones the lungs are pumping out.
Yes, a house needs to have ventilation. Even Google knows:
All homes need ventilation, but most people don’t know how much or what kind. ... They definitely get humid or stinky air out of your home, but they also force unfiltered air into your home through gaps and cracks in the building envelope.
Range hood on a gas stove in a house that was probably built 130 years ago? The stove was probably installed in the ‘50s. That is quite common in the northeast. I would hazard a guess that there are millions of gas stoves without range hoods and millions more with range hoods that don’t vent outdoors.
Scientist pimps for bigger office and more money.
Not universally true. In particular, gas stoves are not normally vented outside. The gas burners on the top of the stove vent directly to atmosphere, as that is where they burn. The burners in the oven and broiler, if so equipped, generally vent out the back of the stove, also directly into the atmosphere.
Additionally not all vent hoods, commonly installed over such stoves, are actually vented. They pull the air from above the stove and run it through a filter and back down over the stove. How to tell if this is true with your stove: Open the cabinet above the vent hood. If there is no pipe (usually 4" or 6" light aluminum) going up through the cabinet directly over the fan, it's probably not venting outside. It is possible they vent into the wall at the back, but you'll have to go up in to the attic to check that.
This is, if not exactly the same model, very similar to the one I put in my kitchen a year ago: https://www.homedepot.com/p/Frigidaire-30-in-5-0-cu-ft-Gas-Range-in-Stainless-Steel-FCRG3052AS/310575941 If you look at the photos, you'll see there is no fitting on it for a vent pipe. It vents directly to atmosphere. If you want to clear combustion products from your home space, you must ventilate it. For the past 40 or 50 years, people have been spending more and more of their time and money doing the opposite in the name of energy efficiency. When I grew up, central heating and air systems were not common. Now they are nearly everywhere, and the houses and apartments are sealed to keep the living space from losing heated or cooled air.
They’re the Eastern distributor!
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